A US police officer accused of bringing targets resembling the fatally shot teen Trayvon Martin to a gun range has been fired.

Port Canaveral, Florida, interim chief executive officer John Walsh told WFTV on Saturday that Sgt Ron King was leading a target practice with two other officers and a civilian when he pulled out the targets April 4. Walsh says King asked the group if they wanted to use the targets, and they said no.

The 17-year-old Martin was killed in 2012 by neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman in a case that led to protests over race and self-defense gun laws. Port Canaveral is about 60 miles (96km) from Sanford, where Martin was killed.

Zimmerman says he shot Martin, who was black, in self-defense. His trial is set for June.

Those paper silhouettes depicted an outline of a hooded man holding skittles and a can of iced tea – the same items that 17-year-old Martin was carrying on the day he was killed in February. It was unclear if the target King carried was the same one.